The Hidden Costs of Aggregate vs Stacked Deductibles
/The Pros & Cons of Aggregate vs. Stacked Health Insurance Deductibles
For anyone comparing two-person or family insurance plans, you need to be aware of Stacked vs Aggregate Deductibles. If you choose the wrong plan, it could end up costing you a lot of money! 😟
AGGREGATE ☉☉☉: The whole family must meet the total deductible BEFORE any member is covered. However, in this plan, one member can meet the deductible for all members of the family.
STACKED 🥞: Each individual member must meet their own deductible before their services are covered. Once the family deductible has been met, then all members are covered.
We find it easiest to understand with this example:
A family of 5 has a plan that has a $6,000 family deductible and $1,000 individual deductibles for each member.
In an Aggregate deductible plan, no one in the family is covered until the family deductible of $6,000 is met. Once that is met, ALL family members are covered in full. Plan on $6,000 out of pocket if you choose this plan.
In a Stacked Deductible plan, when any individual member meets their $1,000 deductible, their services are covered.
A combined $6000 would have to be spent to meet the family deductible before everyone would be covered in full, this can be met by any member of the family unless there are individual contribution caps (i.e. each member can only contribute $2000 toward the family deductible for example.
In this plan, if only one member utilizes services, then you may only need to spend $1,000 out of pocket for that year.
BOTTOM LINE:
(First, we know, this can be very confusing!)
So, if you have a frequent user of insurance benefits on your plan, an aggregate deductible will help everyone get covered sooner.
If everyone is pretty healthy and you don’t expect a lot of medical care, a stacked deductible will be the better choice.
Please leave a comment if you have any questions or insights to share!
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